by Robert Orben
Spring is when the furnace repairmen leave for the French Riviera and the air-conditioning repairmen return.
Spring really gets the vital juices flowing. I just saw two senior citizens standing in front of an X-rated movie singing, “Memories. Memories!”
You can always tell when spring is here by subtle little signs—like, when you start your car in the morning, it does.
STOCKBROKERS
I’m beginning to wonder about my broker. Yesterday I told him to buy a hundred shares of A.T.&T. He said, “Would you spell that?”
My broker keeps talking about things like “the breadth of the market.” To me it’s always been bad.
When I first went to him he said, “Don’t worry. You’re at the end of your financial troubles.” Six months later I’m out $10,000. So I went back to him and said, “I thought you said I was at the end of my financial troubles.” He said, “I did. I just didn’t say which end!”
I’ll tell you when I started to question this broker. There’s nothing wrong with putting $500,000 into a maternity hospital—but in Sun City?
My broker has a peculiar sense of humor. This morning he called me up and said, “I have good news and bad news. The Dow Jones is down thirty points, your portfolio is down forty points, and if you don’t come up with $50,000 to cover margin, we’re selling you out!—And now, the bad news.”
STOCK MARKET
The minister of a church in the financial district closed his sermon with, “Keep one thing in mind: There will be no buying and selling of securities in heaven!” One parishioner leaned over to another and said, “It doesn’t matter. That ain’t where the stock market is going.”
Last week I put half my money in the stock market and half I spent foolishly. Now I’m not sure which half.
Isn’t this a fantastic market? Up, down, up, down—and that’s just my stomach!
I’m so nervous, yesterday I got a fingernail transplant!
Nowadays an investor is someone who stands with both feet firmly on the ground—and his portfolio in it.
I take a philosophical view of things. Like, if God had intended us to be rich, he never would have given us the stock market.
My mother taught me never to get mixed up with bad company. So did the stock market.
One of the first things you learn in the stock market is never listen to anyone who writes out a system to make $1 million in three months—on the back of his unemployment check.
I’ve been so unlucky in the stock market, if life begins at forty, I would have bought it at eighty-seven.
I have a Marie Antoinette approach to the stock market. When things look bad, I lose my head.
The stock market is like the Chinese water torture.
A lot of little drops can drive you crazy!
Personally, I have a Zen philosophy about the stock market. I started off with $10,000—and Zen I had $8,000, and Zen I had $5,000, and Zen I had …
Talk about unusual business gifts, they now have flesh-colored Band-Aids for people who got out of the stock market. They’re yellow.
Everybody’s talking about another 1929. Shakespeare even wrote a play about 1929: The Taming of the Shrewd.
They say 1980 is a leap year. So was 1929.
I feel the same way about the stock market as I do about driving. It would be a lot of fun if it wasn’t for an occasional crash.
Do you ever get the impression that 1929 is being recycled?
Think positively. If the Dow-Jones Average drops ninety-two points in one day, look at all the money you’ll save on prune juice.
They say the stock market is having a technical reaction. That’s right. It can tech every nical you’ve got!
I’ve been having a terrible time in the stock market. Last week my portfolio went down $800—and this was on a Sunday!
I won’t say how I’ve done in the stock market but my wife says we’re the only family on our street with a breadloser.
I have one of those diversified portfolios. I’m 20 percent in utilities, 30 percent in oils, 50 percent in electronics, and 100 percent in hock.
Three years ago I bought a no-load mutual fund and I finally figured out what the no-load refers to—my wallet.
I specialize in Sweet Chariot stocks. The minute I buy them they swing low!
I don’t want to complain, but I just wish my blood pressure was going down like my stocks are.
I don’t know why, but every morning my stocks open lower. I think I have the only companies that go dump in the night.
Some stocks split. Mine just crumble.
I have a diversified portfolio—50 percent are stocks and 50 percent are bombs.
I always buy those breakfast cereal stocks. They go snap, crackle, and drop!
Isn’t this a marvelous technological age we’re living in? We now have two things that are self-cleaning—ovens and the stock market.
SUMMER CAMP
Laugh and the world laughs with you; cry and you have five kids home for the summer.
There are four things you can do to make this a summer your kids will never forget. Send them to a camp that has planned, nutritious meals; that has a varied sports and athletic program; that has trained, understanding counselors; and when you’ve done all this—MOVE!
When you write away for information about a summer camp, five days later you get back a folder showing this lovely ninety-acre estate with two swimming pools, tennis courts, riding stables, and a private lake. The first thing you should understand is, this is not the camp. It’s the owner’s home.… The camp itself is a converted Exxon station!
You have to be very wary of these brochures. They use phrases like “mature leadership.” That means the counselors’ pimples have cleared up.
Another wonderful phrase is “body-building food.” That means mashed potatoes, macaroni, rice, and baked beans three times a day. I don’t know whose body they’re trying to build but I think it’s Jackie Gleason’s!
My kid ate so much mashed potatoes and macaroni, on a hot day he starched his own shirts!
You can’t believe how luxurious some of these camps are. It’s the first time I ever saw a tent with a chandelier.
I know one summer camp that’s so expensive they have Cadillac canoes!
My kid goes to one of those camps where they really rough it. The TV is black and white.
“It is better to have loved and lost.” I’ll tell you who said that. A father who got the bill from summer camp.
Summer camps are where kids make wallets and empty their fathers’.
Every year I used to watch my wife spend days sewing name tapes into our son’s clothes. No more. We just changed his name to Machine Washable.
The most important thing when you send your kid to camp is to make sure he has name tapes in all his clothes. If he doesn’t have name tapes, they’ll call him by any label they can find. Last year, for two whole months, one kid was known as Fruit of the Loom!
The whole idea of summer camp is the buddy system. You do everything with another kid. You walk together, you talk together, you eat together—for six weeks. It’s like a Hollywood marriage, only longer!
I was always unlucky at summer camp. I’ll tell you what I mean. You ever share a sleeping bag with a bed wetter?… Other kids had a pillow. I had a life preserver!
There’s a real science to summer camps. For instance, they always have the girls camp on the other side of the lake. This teaches the boys three things: discipline, self-control, and swimming!
So far he’s been gone three weeks and all we’ve received from him is one postcard—asking if fingers can be transplanted.
July is when you can always tell the experienced parents. They get a letter from their kid in summer camp saying four things are going around—chicken pox, measles, mumps, and bubonic plague—and they send him two aspirin.
One time we went up to visit him and his face was covered with lumps. I said, “What is it? Mumps?” He said, “No. I’m the receiver on th
e baseball team.” I said, “You mean the catcher.” He said, “Sometimes.”
And summer camps are very educational. Thanks to summer camps, kids have no trouble recognizing poison ivy. It’s what’s under the bandages.
Kids always pick the perfect psychological moment to tell you they have poison ivy. It’s right after they shake your hand.
That may sound funny to you but the most difficult thing to explain to a wife is why your son has poison ivy, why you have poison ivy, and why your secretary has poison ivy.
And summer camps teach you other practical things, like how to find your way home when you’re lost in the woods. You don’t know how helpful that is to a kid who lives on Seventy-third Street and Lexington Avenue.
Summer camps are where kids go to change their attitudes, their habits, their routines—everything but their underwear.
My kid swears he takes a bath every Saturday night. If that’s so, he must be drinking it.
When it comes to not taking baths, even for summer camps my kid is exceptional. When I asked for directions to his tent, they said, “Just follow your nose!”
You go into his tent and there are mosquitoes all over the floor. Who can fly with one hand holding your nose?
My wife said, “When he gets home we’re going to need strong soap.” I said, “Are you kidding? When he gets home we’re going to need Oven Off!”
Every year when the kids come back from camp, we celebrate by having our annual barbecue. First, we set fire to something that’s small, hard, and black—their socks.
A lot of people say that kids today are spoiled. Well, let me set your mind at ease. Kids today are not spoiled. It’s just the way they smell after six weeks at summer camp.
My three kids were at the breakfast table this morning and I said to my wife, “It seems like only yesterday they left for summer camp.” She said, “It was only yesterday. They got on the wrong bus.”
It’s amazing the way kids change when they’re away for a few months. If the doorbell rings and someone calls you “Dad,” don’t take any chances. Check the name tape!
My teenager came home three inches taller. I’ll explain how he did that. I told him that every morning he should put on a clean pair of socks. Next time I’ll tell him to take off the old ones first!
SUMMER JOBS
Summertime and the living is easy. Not if you sell snowmobiles.
My son wants me to find him a summer job. He asked me to check with my boss, my friends, my business associates. Then he asked me to run off 100 copies of a résumé, call up the employment agencies, and write an ad for the POSITIONS WANTED section of the newspaper. I asked him what he wanted to call himself in the ad. He said, “A self-starter!”
Kids today want to make a hundred dollars a week on a summer job. A hundred dollars a week! When I was a kid, the only people in town who made a hundred dollars a week were a working couple-Bonnie and Clyde!
I asked my son, “What can you do?” He said, “Nothing.” I said, “Good. I’ll get you a job in the government. They won’t have to break you in.”
No, I’m only kidding. Kids today aren’t afraid of hard work. Kids aren’t afraid of hard work for the same reason I’m not afraid of an African lion. They never get too close to it.
SUPERMARKETS
Ingenuity is what has made America great. One day I was on the speed checkout line at the supermarket. The checker said to the woman in front of me, “I’m sorry, madam, but you have twenty-four items. This line is for carts with eight items or less.” She said, “Wait a minute”—and got two more carts.
I don’t know who’s running the express line at the local supermarket but I think it’s Amtrak.
Something’s got to give. I mean, I don’t mind spending forty-two dollars at the supermarket—but on the express line?
This fella went into a police station and said, “My wife drew $5,000 out of the bank and I think she ran away,” The desk sergeant said, “She drew $5,000 out of the bank? Weren’t you suspicious?” He said, “No. She said she was going to the supermarket.”
Nowadays the easiest way to break a fifty-dollar bill is to drop it on a checkout counter.
It’s terrible. Yesterday hijackers stole $10,000 worth of groceries from a supermarket. Got away in a Volkswagen.
But the stores are really trying. They now have something that lets you get three meals out of one pound of hamburger—the price.
Ladies, I have a great way to save money when you next go shopping: Chop meat! Chop meat right off your shopping list.
STAKEOUT: What you say when you see the price of beef.
And it isn’t just meat. Remember when a buccaneer was a pirate? Now it’s the price of corn.
Do you know what they’re getting for things like cornflakes and puffed rice? They’re called dry cereals. Not anymore. I cry all over them!
You can always tell the newlyweds in a supermarket. They’re the ones who squeeze the breakfast cereal boxes to see if they’re fresh!
I just want to know what the government is doing about the biggest financial problem of them all—the peso! Every time we go into a supermarket, why do we have to peso much?
You can put on airs everywhere else but in a supermarket you have to act your wage.
Food is so expensive, anyone who burps is a liar!
I’ll tell you how fast money goes. I just saw a shopping cart with a racing stripe.
Our grocery bills have been running eighty dollars a week. I told my wife, “Don’t give me any of that inflation stuff! Somewhere you’ve got a 500-pound lover!”
This morning my wife said she had a plan that could cut our food bills in half. I said, “That’s great! What is it?” She said, “Alternate side of the table eating!”
I’ll tell you how high prices are. I just saw a butcher’s bill with a nosebleed.
SWINGERS
I was having a marvelous time in a mate-swapping club until the government loused it up. They passed the truth-in-lending law.
From an efficiency standpoint you just can’t beat a mate-swapping club. It has no dues—and very few don’ts!
I can remember when suburban couples would get together for an evening and swap tales. Come to think of it, they still do.
I’m not what you might call a swinger. You’re looking at the only fella who ever went to an orgy and played charades.
Nowadays many girls offer you sex on a silver platter—which is a wild way to get the tarnish off.
TALK SHOWS
We’ve always had sex education, only it was called by a different name—TV talk shows.
You hear the wildest conversations on talk shows. Like:
“Every day I look at thousands of naked legs and breasts.”
“You’re a producer?”
“No. Colonel Sanders.”
I hear things on these shows Krafft wouldn’t have said to Ebing!
TAXES
I never worry about the future. High interest rates have taught me how to live within my income—and high taxes have taught me how to live without my income.
Thanks to federal, state, county, and city taxes, if you make $50,000 a year it doesn’t mean you have money. It means you had money.
There’s only one problem with soaking the rich—a little of the detergent gets on everyone!
I don’t want to complain but every time they build a tax structure, the first thing they nail is me!
It’s fantastic how many taxes there are. Property taxes, sales taxes, income taxes. They even have taxes on taxicabs and prune juice. They get you coming and going!
We have a bedbug system of taxation. It’s amazing how many different ways they put the bite on you.
In this city a man’s home is his castle. It looks like a home and it’s taxed like a castle.
Taxes are now so high, this morning a neighbor came over and wanted to borrow a cup of something—money!
TEENAGERS
There are only two ways to successfully cope with te
enagers: self-control now or birth control then.
You know that having a calm, reasoned, tranquil discussion with your teenager is in vain—when one of them starts to stick out on your forehead.
A teenager is someone who borrows ten dollars, your new leather coat, and the keys to the car, to take his girl to a lecture on the simple life.
A teenager is someone who calls his parents squares—and then travels fifty-five miles to see a Jack Oakie Film Festival.
When your kids come home at two o’clock in the morning and you ask them where they were, here’s how you can tell if they’re lying: Are their mouths open?
I just heard my first teenager work song. It’s all about sweating and straining and pulling and ripping and cutting and slashing and tearing and lifting. It’s called “Opening Up the Letter with That No-good Check from Home.”
Let’s face it. The only time teenagers put their shoulders to the wheel is when they neck in a Volkswagen!
I have a fifteen-year-old kid who’s always saying, “I have a mind of my own!” When I was fifteen I didn’t even have a bed of my own!
They say teenagers are smarter than ever so I asked mine to do something about the snow on the front walk. Well sir—that vacuum cleaner will never be the same!
I have a question. Millions of kids are searching for their identity. Why is it the first place they look is in the refrigerator?
I know a teenager who got July and August as a summer vacation. So she went into the bathroom to fix her hair. Then in August …
A lot of kids want to replace “The Star-Spangled Banner” as our national anthem. It starts off with “Oh, say can you see?”—and with their haircuts, the answer is “No!”
Teenage haircuts come in three different styles: LONG, LONGER, and PARDON ME, SIR, BUT YOU’RE STANDING ON MY SIDEBURNS!
Teenagers today have the sofa look. All they want is mohair.